The conversation that used to happen by itself

A man has sold books from a small shop in Jeddah for years. Lately most of his sales have moved to his website and to orders by message. The shop is still open, but far fewer people come in.

What he misses is not the till. It is the talk. Regulars used to lean on the counter and tell him what they had just finished, and he would hand them the next thing. Those conversations were where the loyalty came from. People bought from him because he knew them.

His first instinct is to pull everyone back. Better prices in the shop than online. Some titles collected in person only. Make the counter the only way in.

I understand it, but it gets cause and effect the wrong way round. The talk did not happen because of the counter. It happened because people came for the books, and the counter was where they happened to be standing. It was a by-product of good work done in one place. Forcing customers back to the place does not bring back the work. It only makes buying from him harder, and they will notice.

The better move is to stop waiting for the good part to happen by accident and to build it deliberately. A short handwritten note in each parcel about why he picked it. A message every month to each regular, written to them alone, with two titles he thinks they would enjoy. One evening a month in the shop, announced ahead, for anyone who wants to come and talk about what they are reading.

None of that would have occurred to him when it all happened on its own. That was the luxury of the old arrangement: it took no thought.

The new one does. Carrying on as if nothing has changed will not keep any of what he loved about the old one.